Tuesday, December 25, 2012

Haines Christmas Festivities: Christmas Eve Night & Day

When Dani told me that everyone had left for Juneau, I felt a bit perplexed.

"Then... who will be with you Christmas night and who will jump on you in the morning to tell you, 'It's Christmas! It's Christmas?'"

No one is not an exceptable answer.

After a morning of lefse, an evening with the H's and M's, and then the church's candelight service, I started to pack up for the night. Normally I sleep at the new H family. Tonight, I'd head back to the home above the Quikshop.

It was just me and Dani at first, at the Quikshop, and she made me up a luxurious bed that I could snuggle in that night. That's right - my first night there where I wasn't in my closet. She also constructed a spifderunderful tree out of Christmas lights and packing tape on the wall for the gifts to go under. Dude! She made it!

I had a native American man and an eagle on a blanket that night. But, yo, she got a call from a mate needing a place to crash for the night. Oh man. Needing a place to sleep on Christmas? She graciously welcomed her (soon to be her and him) there.

Only thing is, I like to sleep and hadn't brought my sleeping gear (ear plugs and head phones). Ah! But life is good and Daniel had a fan. I discovered a new ever-so-swell sleeping pal - the Fan! He worked awesome and I slept and slept...

Until 6:32 AM.

"It's Christmas!"

And we were up. Dustin and Daisy were watching Fox & the Hound in the living room.

Dani.
Dustin.
Daisy.
MMmm.... wrong name.

Gifts were ripped open. I was delighted to have received a beautiful book of fairy tales from England from Hannah plus a rad charm she made, Music for Two with Béla Fleck and Edgar Meyer, a book of green postcards, and my favourite stationary. I was set and satisfied and glee-ed-out. Thank you family and Hannah!

I bundled up at 7:27 AM to head back the H-home. With a windchill of about negative thirty farenheight, it was certainly not a toasty stroll. My ears began to throb and I pulled my hat down over them and started to run across the glaze ice. I called Carole who was about to get on her flight to come back to Washington from a jaunt to the East Coast to be with family.

Back at the H family, I was over-stoked to find a stocking on my door knob! Ahhh! Was not expecting that and completely thrilled.

They know me oh-so well. As the note said, they knew I was leaving soon and would probably appreciate consumeable gifts. Oh-so-true. What they didn't know is how perfect the gifts were and how each one connected to me and got me giddy.

Toothpaste - I was just running out today and was bummed. "Oh bugger, need to buy new toothpaste. But... maybe I can just make it two weeks without?" Perfect timing.

The toothbrush meant a lot to me due to an event back around December 2007. See, I was living with a host family and I thought they were like my family till one day, I asked my host mum if I could have a toothbrush and she said that was something I should buy. For one of the first times I felt homesick as I realized that, no, this wasn't my family. Long story short, I cried into my pillow and then decided to take control of the situation and have a ball buying a toothbrush for myself! As soon as I left the room, though, to buy it, my host mum was there with a toothbrush and it was orange! "Will this work?" she asked. Anyways, the H family giving me a toothbrush makes me feel like I'm kind of a part of the family.

Ron then drove me up the hill to the Clark home (where I go every Sunday for breakfast) where P, S, C, and S all joyfully greeted me. Wait! I think I'm allowed to use their names. Ahh -- just in case, we'll keep it alphabet here.

Meet the Clark family. They moved to Haines from Virginia.

Grateful for them.

After they opened my gift to them (lava lamp) and they to me (sweetest sewing kit!), we got to work watching Full House and discussing morning events. Goodness, I love this family. We ate hashbrowns, eggs, and bacon, more enjoyable conversation, and I got to listen to my new CD.

For Christmas, the girls got the whole Smurf village set --- but it was the legit set from the 70s and 80s that had been made by Schleich in Deutschland. Legit!

After that, I packed myself up again to go visit the other H family - the beautiful one I lived with in July through early November. For privacy reasons, I don't put pictures up of their family. So, know that things happened, I just can't show you. I felt blessed as we read the Christmas story, talked about it a bit, and sang Christmas carols together. I gave them my Christmas gift. I put together a photo album full of photographs I had taken of their family over the past few months. Mmmm. And Danish somethingorother puff pastry thing. Delicoius.

Oh yes.

And L did my hair.

This is not a flattering photograph of me.

I think I'll post it on the internet.

Hello world.

L took the pictures as wel. Sorry, I hadn't washed my hair in a week.

At 1:30 PM, Chad picked me up again and we headed back to the Clarks so we could walk over to the Greens to celebrate some more! Dinner time!

Dinner was goat (yum!), green beans, homemade gluten-free sweet potatoe bread, brown rice, and salad. So good! And for dessert I got to eat this peanut-butter cheesecake with snickers on the bottom and a dark chocolate topping. Also decadent.

We played Life and made music and it was lovely lovely lovely. Bill and Carol were there too!

At around 6 PM, it was time to make it back home to the Horn's. When I got there, they had Dorris Ward and her son and nephew there. I still had my hair up the way L had done it. I joined them for some conversation which I liked.

And then at 8 PM - I Skyped with my family in Seattle!

Can you tell I'm tired and ready to go to bed? It's past my bedtime. Anyways - I saw my cats and Dad played the pump organ and Mom was pretty and ian was rad and they opened their gifts from me....

Photographs on RAMM

All photographs on this blog have been taken by me, Mägi, unless I am in them or noted otherwise. Please respect me by not reposting the pictures unless you give full credit (Photograph by Mägi Hubert) and by linking back to the original post. Do not manipulate, photoshop, or crop them, though. If you give full credit, link back, and aren't using it in a disrespectful way - go for it, use the photographs - enjoy.

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This blog serves the purpose of giving me a place to get all of those ideas in my head sorted out as well as an addition place to document my life. This is the closest you might get to understanding me (although I don't know why you'd want to - some things are simply best left undiscovered).